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Topic: Leaving Earth : Our goal, the stars (Read 1818 times)

Hello Comrade... The year is 1956 and I have setup the game on Hard with 4 Easy Missions, 2 Medium, and 2 Hard missions. As you can see below we eventually need to put a man on Venus and build a Mars station. But first, we must launch a capsule or probe into space followed by a man and orbit and put a man on the moon as well. These missions are chosen at random at the beginning of the game so there is some variety to the game and events that can happen as well as a random selection to the cards of the Moon, Mars, Suborbital Flight (Marked as Unexplored to begin with because all we know is what we see in the sky) etc.... which have different effects and challenges of their own.

We have started in 1956 (Game ends 1976 in which you should have all missions completed) with our yearly 25M budget to spend on research and components... plus we need to plan out missions by calculating the requited mass/thrust ratios etc..... So far so good..... Solo rules are included and play as with normal game.

I did some digging on this game, PE...I'm not sure how Mars can factor in to a game that limits the timeframe to 1956-1976. Seems somewhat difficult to get someone to Mars on 1970s tech.

It would be, however it is abstracted out. For example there is a calculation with the mass x difficulty = thrust required. So you have to research the appropriate rockets etc... then set off to explore. The calculations needed and path to Mars is very difficult as you can see above there are different stages you have to traverse enroute and a lot that can go wrong. So the technology is abstracted in a way that makes it possible, but very difficult and you can see that a man on Mars is 20 points where just putting a man into space is 4.

I believe as the years pass and depending on your mission failures or successes you will have to juggle priorities. Meaning I don't believe the Venus and Mars missions are probable for both being obtainable because of setbacks during the other missions and the cost that is involved. It will take some years to amass the required equipment... life-support, rockets etc.... to launch the mission.... which if there are failures could set you back again.

Here is a quote from the manual on Mars:

Quote

MarsThere has long been an expectation that Mars might bear life, from “canals”observed by telescope in the late 1800s to observations in the twentieth century.Shifting patches of what appeared to be seasonal vegetation strengthened thisview. If life could be found on Mars, it might provide great insight into howlife first came to be on Earth. This quote from biologist Frank Salisbury in1962 is typical of many people’s view on Martian life at the time:We’ve already said that the color change fits neatly into aspring-summer vegetation cycle. A second point in favor of lifeis that when the yellow clouds do cover the planet they don’tpermanently tinge the markings yellow. Within a couple of weeks,whatever it is there shakes it off or grows up through the cover.Mariner 4 was sent on a fly-by of Mars, reaching the planet in 1964. It returnedthe first close-up photographs of the red planet, showing a disappointinglybarrensurface, with many craters and no evidence of liquid water.Viking 1 landed on Mars in 1976, carrying four separate experiments to testfor Martian life. One of the four came back with a positive result, indicatingthe presence of life, while the other three came back negative. The implicationsof these tests are still being debated to this day. As no sample has beenreturned from Mars, further tests have only been done by sending new probes.Today we know that Mars once had rivers and oceans of liquid water, asshown by geological evidence. The planet might have once presented anenvironment hospitable to life billions of years ago. The general consensus,however, is that Mars is probably lifeless today.

I find the calculations to be fascinating, actually, in how simplistic they are to do something so complicated and yet manage to put it into a usable frame to make a game that does look fun to play.

I downloaded the rules and read some of it...so I can totally grok to the research/try your luck slant here and suspend disbelief. It would make a Mars landing in the 1970s something of a miracle, not to mention quite an accomplishment.

1956We research JUNO rockets and assemble a Probe to put into Suborbital space. The Probe will take 2 Juno rockets to gain enough thrust to place it into suborbital space. Once assembled, we are prepared for launch after a 15M investment. A lot is riding on a good start to our space program comrade.

We are go for launch 5...4...3...2...1...... Major Failure as the rocket explodes and the Probe scatters into pieces throughout the sky....

Another 5M to fix the problem (remove the failure card) and then another 2M Investment into another Probe and 3M for 3 Juno Rockets.

This time around the launch is a successful and the Probe lifts off and into Suborbital space. Our first success.